By complete accident on my last PB I realized that you could slide off one of the elevators with the dialogue prompt up. I was going fast so I didn't have time to experiment, but it seemed like an odd quirk that might be exploitable. Decided to sit down with it today, and found that you are able to diagonally slide off this elevator by doing so and squeeze into a passage you're not supposed to be able to access, saving about a minute and some change because you don't have to unlock the blue and red gates in order to proceed.

I think it's poetic that this was my absolute least favorite part of the game casually - I dreaded it every time for over a decade - and now I never have to do it again assuming this is consistent. :,)

I think it's poetic that this was my absolute least favorite part of the game casually - I dreaded it every time for over a decade - and now I never have to do it again assuming this is consistent. :,)

I honestly feel this on a deeply personal level and hope you can get it to be consistent.

Not that this is relevant to anyone in the world who isn't me, since literally no one else speedruns this game anymore, but I got it to be consistent with a certain setup. It's quite possible that this is what pushes me to 2nd place if I get a run where everything else also goes well.

well i meant more that unlike finding something in OoT this currently impacts virtually nobody who isn't me LOL

although if you're like me and you hate this segment casually you could just use this and skip it. we think it might be GC exclusive because they patched how the initial slide works in later versions. no one's tested yet

edit: i should upload a clickbait tutorial on youtube.. "Tales of Symphonia HACK: SKIP the red and blue gates?????" and then only mention it's GC exclusive in the comments after i get the clicks

(unfortunately for some reason [can't fathom really] most people don't care about a 6+ hour jrpg speedrun only 11 people have been obsessive enough to do (for gc ng+ anyway). :()

I'm rarely impressed with any RPG speedrun. What is it impressive to see a run which is about avoiding battles, skipping large amounts of content, exploiting sequence-breaks and glitches and barely involves any form of reflexes at all?

I understand strategies are needed to low-level the bosses but one can look all of those up and copy them and even then you may as well just do a low-level run and not skip all the content.

(unfortunately for some reason [can't fathom really] most people don't care about a 6+ hour jrpg speedrun only 11 people have been obsessive enough to do (for gc ng+ anyway). :()

I'm rarely impressed with any RPG speedrun. What is it impressive to see a run which is about avoiding battles, skipping large amounts of content, exploiting sequence-breaks and glitches and barely involves any form of reflexes at all?

I understand strategies are needed to low-level the bosses but one can look all of those up and copy them and even then you may as well just do a low-level run and not skip all the content.

*cracks knuckles*

Hello. I'm under the impression you've never tried speedrunning Tales of Symphonia. By all means, try to beat jay's world record. I'll happily watch with popcorn. I've been working at it for two solid years, and after discovering a 1.5 minute time save, I am only close to perhaps beating second place at my current level.

I don't think you are quite grasping the sheer level of expertise that is required to optimize this run. It's more than maintaining ABSOLUTE FOCUS for 6 STRAIGHT HOURS. It's more than memorizing exactly where to go and what to do and when to be mashing buttons and already pressing the control stick in the correct direction before you've even entered the next room. It's absolute and complete MASTERY of the game's real-time battle system.

You need to know how to spell cancel, and in Regal's case that means holding L while you alternate between left B, down B, and neutral B with perfect timing to maintain your combo while also spamming the up and down C-stick to constantly macro the AI - BUT keeping an eye on the combo counter, because as soon as it exceeds 20-30 you need to drop the combo to prevent causing a tech down which generally loses about 10-15 seconds per fight. Years of research have gone into optimizing the correct EX skills for optimal party setups. Before each fight, we have tested party setups, timed hundreds of fight samples for the best times, and compared that to the time it takes to set up those parties in that menu, in order to find the optimal route.

The people who speedrun these games are perfectly okay skipping "all the content" because we love these games enough that we have the lore memorized anyway. I played ToS fourteen times casually. I know the content. Now, I have a measurable way to prove that I am literally better at the game than everyone else except 2 people.

Try it. There's an extensive route documented on SRC slash tos. I doubt you'll get into the single digits without practicing your ass off.